dunson

use your truman scholarship to get yourself a rhodes, and you're a shoe-in at yale (i know at least 10 people who did this, including multiple people who had lower gpa's than yours.) congrats on the truman, by the way. i didn't even get an interview for one of my campus nominations. frickin' over-achievers at my school ....

even without the rhodes, i'm sure you're a great candidate. yale definitely does its damnedest to get all the trumans.

to answer the subsequent question: truman scholars are recipients of one of the most prestigious public service scholarship (the truman scholarship). it's worth 30,000 towards grad school, i think, and the scholars get to spend a summer in DC working for the government and basically get hooked up in terms of connections, etc. i still wish i'd managed to get one. but oh well, life goes on.

How much would being a Truman Scholar help your admission chances at top 3 if you are black. LSAT: 165 GPA: 3.89

helps a lot, but that is the same if you are white or non URM. The Truman itself is a big booster at H/S. I wouldn't go so far as to say it is a guarantee, but I'd be pretty surprised if an applicant with those credentials didn't get into Harvard and Stanford.

use your truman scholarship to get yourself a rhodes, and you're a shoe-in at yale (i know at least 10 people who did this, including multiple people who had lower gpa's than yours.) congrats on the truman, by the way. i didn't even get an interview for one of my campus nominations. frickin' over-achievers at my school ....

even without the rhodes, i'm sure you're a great candidate. yale definitely does its damnedest to get all the trumans.

I think you underestimate just how many Trumans apply for the Rhodes Scholarship (I would put the figure close to around 70%) and apply to Yale (of those interested in law which is a good 60%+ I'd say about 90-95% apply to Yale). Unfortunately you cannot use the Truman to get yourself a Rhodes or Yale admission--it might signal that you may be competitive for both, but it certainly doesn't guarantee you either. I would guess in any given year about 40+ Truman Scholars are applying to Yale and out of that maybe 10 are accepted. We have even seen that having the Truman + Rhodes not to mention excellent numbers has not guaranteed admission at Yale. So I think Yale is a wash; you just have to do the best you can in crafting a kick-butt application and hope for the best.